


Stands to Treason

by ChelseaDear



Category: Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: Character Study, Internal Monologue, Oneshot, takes place during s4e10
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-18
Updated: 2021-02-18
Packaged: 2021-03-14 15:16:06
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,111
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29544345
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ChelseaDear/pseuds/ChelseaDear
Summary: Jesse's facing down a firing squad that wears his face because he did the right thing instead of the easy thing.Takes place during season 4, episode 10.
Kudos: 5





	Stands to Treason

Treason.

Jesse had been accused of treason.

Fives stood beside him, the both of them cuffed, the both of them accused of the same thing.

Clones shouldn't know how to commit treason; they'd been bred for loyal and obedience, their genetic template modified so they wouldn't question orders. Rank, the denotation by which the order of command was placed into order, was where power came from. Rank was earned by both merit and experience, and on the field of battle those could make those around you override dangerous things like fear and doubt and pride.

What if, just what if, the right thing and treason were one in the same.

They had disobeyed orders, yes. They had done so outright and in plain sight of the entire 501st. Jesse knew they would be court marshaled over it. The consequences were worth it, when those were the consequences. 

Worth it to save the rest of the 501st.

Clones weren't just a series of genetic modifications from the template donor; they were **trained** , and in their training they were taught that their brothers were _valuable._ Not just as assets and soldiers, but as compatriots as well. It was through their bond as brothers they could rise above the limited power they carried as individuals. No man got left behind; no man got forgotten.

Except they'd left Hardcase behind, hadn't they?

They'd had to; if they'd followed, none of them would have made it back. And they _had_ to come back. destroying the supply ship was only a part of their mission.

Hardcase's death hadn't just been a loss. It had been a **sacrifice.**

His death was a sacrifice that had saved the rest of what was left of the 501st from becoming a total loss – from becoming numbers again, their names scratched from their records as their new numbers took the shape of a part of the total lives lost in the name of protecting the Republic.

Jesse had served either under or in close proximity to many Jedi Generals. Krell was not like them; he was too close-minded, too _dogmatic_ where pragmatic considerations needed to be made; he put no value on life. The clones, to him, were no different than the droids were to the Seppies: disposable, replaceable, a mockery of life itself.

Jesse had served under General Skywalker long enough to know that ideas such as _improbable,_ , _ill-advised,_ and even _impossible_ were just that: ideas. And so long as you had the people who were willing to try and the tools to give those people, that's all they had to be. Just ideas.

They did not need to become plans or worse – become actions. So long as you and the people around you kept your wits and your honor about you, ideas did not have to get in the way of victory.

All it took to let ideas that had no room in plans for victory, though, was one person. All it took was one person who let doubt or fear or some other too-human quality that take root where loyalty and trust were supposed to have already been propagated. Trust that was inherent by virtue of rank. That was the bedrock of following orders, that trust.

And _that_ was what the mental modifications had been for. _That_ was what was supposed to be inhibited, the all too dangerous ability to question their trust in their superiors – _not_ the ability to ask themselves how deeply they valued the lives of their brothers.

This was a war. People died in war. Soldiers died with at a much higher frequency than civilians because _that was what soldiers were supposed to do._ Soldiers died so everyone else could live.

_The Clone Wars._ That's what they were being called. Mostly by those who would never fight in them, but still. It was in the name. This was _their_ war. They were the ones who were destined to **be** the difference between victory and defeat once the war was over. Not the Jedi. Not the senate.

Clones.

Droids did not need to be fed. Nor did they need things like sleep or showers or even air. On paper, droids were more cost effective than clones, but things on paper did not hold up to the realities of war, and one particular reality of _this war_ was that it absolutely needed humanity's ability to make their own decisions when the situation called for it and _that_ was why this war belonged to the clones.

There was a much smaller war going on right now, on a captured Umbaran base. This war was not one for the very heart and soul of the Republic, but its stakes were still high.

This was a war that tested where loyalties lie. 

Did the loyalties of the 501st lie with the Jedi General who wasn't even _their_ Jedi General whose orders were seemed to do nothing but result in needless death? With this _stranger_ who thought them no better than the droids the Seppies tasked to do their fighting for them?

Or, much more simply, did their loyalties lie with their brothers?

Judging by how the firing squad still had their guns pointed at them, it was, at present, Krell wining this Clone War in Miniature.

They'd been offered blindfolds as if it would be a mercy for _them._

No. He would not face his death blind; he would face it directly, staring down the faces who looked just like he did. He _wanted_ them to remember exactly who they were about to gun down for saving the entire 501st.

Two of their _brothers._

Jesse was not proud or arrogant, yet still he managed to keep his head held high as he stared down his executioners. 

He hoped they never forgave themselves for this. 

But beyond that, he hoped one day they shook the mental chains they'd had foraged for them from before they were created. He hoped that one day they, too, could see that loyalty and obedience were not the same thing. He hoped that they saw and, more importantly, that they _understood_ that they were capable of making decisions for themselves.

That they would understand they _weren't_ the same as droids, things to be programmed. That thinking for themselves wasn't a flaw.

But oh, hope. Hope was not a weapon of war. Hope was the final way to torture someone who had nothing at all left. Not _nothing left to lose_ – nothing left at all.

On a strictly selfish level, he was so, so scared.

He did not want to die like this.

He did not want to die with so much hope left for his brothers.


End file.
